“Are police officers necessarily more trustworthy than alleged criminals? I think not.” Alexander writes. “Not just because the police have a special inclination toward confabulation, but because, disturbingly, they have an incentive to lie. In this era of mass incarceration, the police shouldn’t be trusted any more than any other witness, perhaps less so.”
…
Alexander notes that “In the war on drugs, federal grant programs like the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program have encouraged state and local law enforcement agencies to boost drug arrests in order to compete for millions of dollars in funding. Agencies receive cash rewards for arresting high numbers of people for drug offenses, no matter how minor the offenses or how weak the evidence. Law enforcement has increasingly become a numbers game.” …

OSU law professor and author Michelle Alexander

“Research shows that ordinary human beings lie a lot — multiple times a day — even when there’s no clear benefit to lying. … The natural tendency to lie makes quota systems and financial incentives that reward the police for the sheer numbers of people stopped, frisked or arrested especially dangerous. One lie can destroy a life, resulting in the loss of employment, a prison term and relegation to permanent second-class status.”

In the time it took you to read this post, another person was arrested for marijuana by a local, state or federal officer; roughly one every 42 seconds, or about 700,000 per year.

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